Work Text:
July 4
15:18
Soft as moonlight on an evening rose was the sensation of fingers running gently through strands of hair. Trinity closed her eyes to the world as the distant, steady sounds of the cardiac monitor blanketed her mind. Her grasp on the present loosened, ambition fading like distant stars, and as memories of the day dripped through the cracks, Trinity thought of but one person. Phantom fingers sprouted a body in mind; they crawled along the skin of her face and coaxed green eyes to open. The nothingness gave way to a blurred blend of color.
She blinked repeatedly, each time failing to dispel the collecting tears. Her head fell between the palms of both hands, cradled with a tenderness Trinity did not feel worthy of but still wanted, while her knees met her chest. It was an entirely unprofessional sight. Were anyone to walk in, dread would have Trinity doing away with Pittsburgh altogether.
The thought alone would have been enough to bring movement to her limbs, had been time and time again in the past. It wasn’t in this moment, not with the weight of pain from a lifetime upon her shoulders. Sadness escaped its home at the edge of advertency, cascaded down the sides of her cheeks to fall to the ground. Helpless to prevent their descent, Trinity gave in to the feeling completely. Let the waves of despair lap at her feet until they consumed her.
It was peaceful to float along the waters. Coldness traced the edges of her figure, but it lacked when compared to that which found reprieve between her ribs. Trinity had carried it for so long now. It tainted every relationship, a spectre mimicking her every move beneath the covers of shadows, awaiting the moment it could bleed out into her entire body and onto that of another.
Trinity did all she could to quieten her sounds of sorrow. One hand went to cover her mouth while the other rubbed circles on the back of her neck in search of consolation. She briefly entertained the thought of digging her nails into the skin of her arms, but did not want to undo all of her progress on account of one bad day. Nor did Trinity want the questions that might follow. She had to remind herself that there were now people who cared enough to notice. Though perhaps not anymore.
She pressed her palm harder against her lips, but to no avail, as her cries leaked out and settled into the desolate room. It was as if Trinity was looking from her body through a window, stained by the fingertips of others. That she wished to collect herself and return to her duties did not matter. Instead, all Trinity could do was gather herself in her own arms and weep.
Time passed her by without notice as she trembled in the corner of the room. It was to the cries of another that she raised her head. Trinity wiped away the tears even as they continued to trickle down and stood. The murkiness of sadness receded long enough for her to remember which room she collapsed into, and that she had never truly been alone.
A baby, bundled in the impersonal blankets of the Pitt, lay in a bassinet at the other edge of the room. Trinity had not thought much about her since Perlah mentioned an abandoned patient in passing, after giving her a protein bar and a concerned look that went ignored. Between catching up on her charting and assisting Robby with trauma patients, she did not have the time to really think about anything. It had been a blessing to sunder her mind from the stream of thoughts and drink in the numbness only a routine could offer.
It was all she could think about now as she hesitantly approached the wailing baby. Each step was seemingly in defiance of some baser instinct. Trinity was never one to comfort others, not when it had never been given freely in her youth. Each act of affection always came with a price, and Trinity had long run out of funds. Her pockets emptied by the same hands meant to wrap around her when she needed love.
The baby was rather small, with rosy cheeks and unblinking eyes. Her cries rose in volume, as if realizing there was now another to share her pain with. Trinity wiped some more at her eyes and looked around, hoping that someone might take the baby from her and then disappear. There was only her.
“I’m starting to understand why you got left here.” She mumbled. She looked to the entrance of the room one last time, and when none appeared, she sighed, looking down at the baby with a reluctant acceptance. Trinity brought the baby into her arms. Her rotation in pediatrics left her with basic knowledge of how to care for a baby, but it all seemed to have fled along with the rest of her composure. She returned to her place on the floor.
“Don’t cry. Please don’t cry,” Trinity begged, rocking them both. “I don’t know what to do.”
Her own tears were relentless. Time stretched around this moment, made it into something that lasted infinitely, and Trinity was helpless to stop the onslaught of memories, once cherished that now bore the indelible mark of her failures. She thought of Dennis, the roommate she had not wanted to care for, but that she now found herself bringing down her walls for. The disappointment in his eyes and the downturn of his mouth when she could not console him after Louie’s passing. And she thought of all the patients she ever treated, of the way she, at times, overlooked issues and assumed the worst in nearly every case because it was all she had ever known in life.
More than anything else, she thought of brown eyes—the depth and warmth always to be found in them—and their refusal to meet her own gaze when she needed it most. Her first lover to not leave with the rising of the sun, and the person whose affection, in the few times it was given, filled that emptiness inside her. Memories of her, doused in adoration and fear, caught aflame as Trinity continued to cry. She felt the heat of them in her fingertips, the same ones that often sought comfort on the skin of her favorite person. It ran along her arms and legs. There wasn’t one part of her that had never felt Yolanda’s mystifying affection.
It was never truly Trinity’s to receive. In each of their minds existed a picture of the other, blank in the spots where neither dared offer enough to fill. The passing of months brought many new revelations, each with enough pieces of them both to maintain the facade of vulnerability. Whoever it was that Yolanda extended her fondness towards was not Trinity, at least not the one who collapsed against cold hospital walls with babies in her arms. At a distance, they remained, and the void between them sat heavy in her heart, even when she wanted nothing more than to cross it. Trinity did not know how to, or if awaiting arms would bring her closer once she made the first step.
“What do I do?” She questioned as she stared into the baby’s eyes, seeing in them the familiar tells of abandonment taking hold of one’s being. Her hope that there might be an answer for her floated just beyond her reach, grounded in nothing as the ties were severed years ago by her own hands when none dared reach for her. Trinity reached for it now when she was without certainty. It had always been a given that she would bounce back from anything; it was who she was. But she no longer knew who that was anymore.
Someone faceless puppeted her limbs and got her through the past few days. After hearing of his impending release from prison, Trinity loosened her hold on reality. It was not intentional; she had not wanted to let him take from her the present when he already had the past. But with each shift, and the familiar stories and pain, only a tug was needed to tear it from her grasp. It lay at her feet, coiled around her ankles, and even without cognizance, reality had a way of demanding attention.
The baby wrapped her tiny hand around one of Trinity’s fingers and brought it closer. The sight made Trinity close her own eyes and let out a small, strangled whimper. It was beyond her how someone could find it within themselves to abandon a child to this world; a child who had done no wrong, who had not chosen life but clung to it nonetheless. She was strong, and Trinity was glad for it, but she also knew it would never be enough.
“Ili-ili, tulog anay.” Her voice was unsteady. Rising in some parts like a wave, only to crash in the next, barely above a whisper. “Wala diri imo nanay.”
The lullaby was never meant for her ears, yet she had carried it with her through life since the first time she heard it. Trinity remembered the day as if it never ended. She and one of her younger brothers, Angel, had been racing through the streets of their neighborhood on bikes. Trinity’s was an aged mountain bike, painted in black and blue; the colors of boyhood, according to her mother, not meant for a little girl like herself. Her brother’s brand new and shiny. They had only gone out to use it for the first time. It was never supposed to have ended the way it did.
Angel had always taken to life the way a boy who had never known true fear is wont to do. A second was never spared to imagine what might unfold were he to heed the voice in his head that chased adrenaline. He did not on that day, when daring her to take him up on a race to the end of the cul-de-sac where their house resided. Angel had set off like the waning sun, leaving her behind to watch his silhouette fade into the darkening sky.
Trinity remembered only the sounds of what followed, of the car and the collision. Then, the pained screams of her brother as his side collided with the street. The obscenities later lobbed at her by her mother as she ran to him, bringing him into her arms and holding him tightly. Her mother’s ire had never been expressed so vividly. Hers was the kind that came with pointed looks over shoulders and quiet insults under her breath when she was not being perceived by others, whose opinions she shaped her life around. Their language was not of words, but the silence borne from their inability to understand one another. It had been unsettling to see her mask pulled back, revealing the wrath that long existed beneath.
Frightened and miserable, Trinity had retreated to the shadows, where she licked her own wounds and sucked in her tears, lest anyone catch sight of them. The words, sung to her brother with all the love a mother ought to have for her children by someone who was not, were carried across the distance by the wind. Trinity had let them wrap around her like a blanket, even if she was not the one meant to feel their warmth.
Her mother never deigned to forgive her after that day. Even when his wounds healed with time, Trinity’s had remained.
“Kadto tienda bakal papay.” Trinity weeped. “Ili-ili tulog anay.”
…
16:27
“Meet back here in thirty for a debrief.”
Trinity peeled the gloves stained with blood from her hands like a layer of skin. The scent of death clung to every inch of the room, and each inhale only brought it further inside. She could not breathe without tasting it on her tongue, rotten and wrong. It lined the inside of her lungs and pulled at the strings of her mind, tangling her thoughts until they took on a voice not her own. One that mirrored that of the little girl whose sadness bled red beneath the cover of the room.
She studied Robby’s retreating figure and wondered how he remained afloat, not pulled beneath the waves as she was. But Trinity remembered that distant visage he would sometimes wear when prying eyes were turned away. He could be at her side, yet in an entirely different world than the one Trinity longed to escape. She also remembered scraps of the story Dennis let spill from his lips in a bout of drunkenness one night. Trinity had not bothered to weave them together; her troubled memories of that day were enough to cover the world. The scraps came together before her now like a tapestry, stitched by the same wobbly hands that had done her own. They were not all that different after all. The past had a way of finding everyone.
The gloves were hurled into the waste basket. Trinity left the room and made to run a hand through her hair before glimpsing the bloodied room just as the curtains shut. A young woman lay alone on the bed with gauze tucked away into her open wounds that still leaked out onto the floor. Her traits were barely discernible. She could have been anyone. The strands of straight black hair that dangled from the side of the gurney made Trinity think of only one person.
Her hand fell limp at her side. This day would find a home in her soul beside the rest.
Trinity took a moment to rid her features of what clawed at the back of her throat and pushed from behind her eyes. She set off to the nurse’s station. Bodies brushed against her own as she moved through the sea of them. Their warmth traveled along the skin of her arms, entirely unpleasant and all too much so that her chest could not rise and fall. Arms felt wrapped around her figure. Each attempt to take in air only left her with the need for more. She grabbed at the collar of her shirt to unwind the hands around her neck.
She moved through the room with her feet dragging behind as if sunken beneath the sand. Trinity could have cried in relief when she found what might have been the only empty pocket of space left of the ED had she any more tears to give. She grabbed her stethoscope and pressed the metal against the burning skin of her forehead. The sensation was grounding; a reprieve from the oppressive heat that filled the room with the power out.
Awareness returned to her like falling leaves in autumn. She let her eyes roam around the room. Patients were scattered across the floor, some against the edges of the wall, and others attended to by doctors and nurses in the center. Trails of blood disappeared into the trauma rooms, and the specks of the substance painted onto the scrubs of everyone made the entire scene look as if it were taken from a movie. There was not one person untouched by what always followed collective merriment: the quick and disastrous end of it.
“Hey,” A familiar voice greeted. Trinity need not see her roommate to know he had found her despite her efforts to avoid him.
It was not displeasure or irritation that had her turning corners to escape his gaze; it was that he could see her. Not the Santos beared to the world, but the woman who slept with a night light and cried at every movie. Trinity could not handle him seeing her unravel entirely because she knew he would bring the pieces of her into his grasp and try to breathe life back into them. His inevitable failure to do so would only hurt her more than the look on his face at the distance she tried to carve between them. He was the only good in the world that escaped being ruined by it, and she would sooner leave everything behind than be the one to change that.
“I know you’re not doing okay, so I’m not going to ask. Just,” He hesitated, scratching at the side of his head, as he always did when uncomfortable with the situation he found himself in. “Know that I am here if you need anything.”
In his gaze was such a genuine concern that Trinity had to look away as the burning returned to her eyes. She brought her tongue to the top of her mouth. “I’m not doing okay,” Trinity admitted. The words felt foreign and heavy in her mouth. She could not remember a time she ever willingly allowed them to be heard by another. “But I don’t need coddling. So don’t be all weird about it, capeesh?”
Her words carried a taste of resentment that was not his to receive. She hoped he knew that. He was so patient with her as she navigated the uncertainty of friendship once more. Always there, lingering in the light to pull her from the shadows when they enclosed on her and share with her the succor that had surrounded him in his childhood, fickle as it was. His time on the farm, with all of his siblings and the neglect and maltreatment that came with their presence, meant that, although love had never been his to hold onto for long, he knew how to make it last for the times when there was none given. He brought to their cramped apartment embers and had stroked them to life alone in the frigid silence she brought. She still did not know how to keep the fire alive, but she was learning with him.
The understanding that settled over his features lessened the weight upon her shoulders. She took in a deep breath of the air still marred by death and despair, and let them sink. He opened his mouth, undoubtedly to let free more words of support that would only worsen her state, despite his intentions. Words never did much for her, not when they always disguised what truly lay hidden in the hearts of many. She had let herself be consoled by their words before, only to be torn apart by them when the moon retired.
Whatever he was going to say was lost to the noise of the ED when a sudden scream reached them both and took hold. Their heads turned toward the general direction of the sound, but with all the bodies and murmurs of pain, neither could tell from whom it originated. A part of her did not want to leave this moment behind because she did not know if there was enough of her left to be the doctor all these patients needed.
“Santos, Whitacker,” Robby’s voice came from the far side of the room.
At the sound of their names, the stillness that had taken hold of them both evanescened. Trinity sighed under her breath at the absurdity of thinking the world might just listen to her this once and stop spinning when it had never before. And at her own selfishness for wanting to put herself above the many people whose lives teetered on the edge of life and death. It was her hands that would pull them back, and so she closed her eyes, resolving not to let them shake anymore with all the emotions stored inside, for they would surely fall. She would have to place the lid over them and hope they would not seep between the cracks to find her again.
They weaved their way through bodies and gurneys and equipment. Space was a luxury that could not be afforded on a day like this. He was alone, hunched over the unmoving body of a boy Trinity treated earlier, when the flood of people had not yet crashed against the Pitt and turned them inside out. Blood poured from the wounds all over him. His eyes were so lifeless they could have been glass.
She had found his humor and joviality in the face of mortality disturbing, as he retold the story of how he got too close to a firework. It was a verbiage of deflection she knew fluently. She did not want to imagine what life must have been like for this boy to have already built the walls he needed to hide himself from it. All she wished for was that liveliness, with the squinted eyes and lopsided smile, instead of the blankness covering his face.
Trinity assumed his position as he stepped away to retain his breath. She was never one to enjoy this aspect of the profession. The feeling of human ribs breaking beneath her touch was unlike anything else; it stayed with her even when she wanted to do without the reminder that life was so fragile.
“Talk to me,” Her voice, soothing as a scratch down her back, was the last thing Trinity needed to hear when she already struggled to remain afloat. She did all she could to ignore her voice and the one that resounded in her mind, saying that only Yolanda could gather the pieces of her stowed across time into her arms and not forsake her when the jagged edges drew blood.
She saw from the corner of her eye the way Dennis glanced at her from his place at the boy’s legs. He applied pressure to the deepest wounds along the side while Robby took over bagging. “We’ve got a 7-year-old male who got hit by fireworks. Multiple wounds, bleeding out fast. Lost a pulse. Doing CPR now.”
His words came to her as if she were beneath the ice of a frozen lake. She could grasp nothing but the rapid thump of her heart in her ears and the slower one of her hands against the little boy’s chest. His entire body, small as it was, jerked with each compression. Her arms ached, and sweat collected at the collar of her shirt and slid down the side of her face. Strands of her hair escaped from the ponytail she hastily did before leaving the pediatric wing. She was losing herself to it all, the popping of bones and the mechanical way with which she moved, but it was not enough to do away with the realization that the boy was too far gone.
“What’s next?” Robby asked, even though all knew there was nothing more to do.
“Nothing. He’s lost too much blood,” Trinity panted between compressions. “We need to call it.”
An odd emotion was on his face as he stared at her. She could not understand its familiarity until she took in the melancholy swathed in something else that showed in his eyes. It was the same one painted on the faces of the imaginary family she used to draw before the day her mother’s indifference became wrath and her father’s silence, resentment. She had wanted it in place of the narrowed eyes and clenched jaw that always stared across the table at dinner. Trinity found it unsettling to be on the receiving end of it, even when it was all she ever wanted in her youth.
He nodded eventually, and she returned the gesture as she stopped compressions, tearing bloodied gloves from her hands. She could feel eyes upon her, but she paid them no mind. Trinity did not want to imagine what resided in either of their gazes.
Trinity looked down at her watch. “Time of death: 16:42.”
She waited only for Dennis to write the time on the tag circling the patient’s wrist before she walked away. Another second spent with the lifeless body of someone who did not deserve for one mistake to end it all, or to see that same quality in the eyes of the woman she had grown to love, would have made what remained of her composure, ashes in her mouth that could not be swallowed down any longer. Trinity knew now it was love that blossomed within her. Sometime between their first night spent together and the simple exchanges had mornings over pancakes and yogurt, the seed had taken root, and branches now crawled up her throat. She could not breathe without feeling its presence.
Yolanda had never been meant to become someone who could hurt her. Their agreement all those months ago was to find only a brief haven in the joining of their bodies at night and nothing more. Trinity had always been the one to slip from beneath the covers as soon as their moment passed and think about it every step back under the moonlight to her apartment. But in the past few weeks, with their nights spent in Trinity’s bed, Yolanda had been the one to wrap herself around her and stay. Trinity did not want to take to it as she did, but it was impossible not to melt into her warmth and get used to it.
Their interaction earlier that day, if it could even be considered as such, had not left her mind. Even with fingers wrapped around the intestines of a patient, Yolanda’s gentle dismissal replayed in her mind over and over again. Others noticed, but with all the chaos of a power outage, none found the time to confront her, save for Dennis. It would not have upset her so had it followed any other string of events. Disappointed perhaps, but Trinity was an adult who learned long ago how to deal with her emotions alone. They often rescheduled their meetings on busy days anyway. It was only that now Trinity knew what it was like to have someone stay; every moment spent apart felt like being without air.
She never fared well when left alone with her thoughts, either. Her worst decisions were always made in the silence of her mind following the episodes of dissociation that frequented her adolescence. Therapy worked wonders to bring an end to that habit, but she knew today had brought to the surface emotions she did not want to carry alone anymore, even if they would not destabilize her as they had then.
Trinity went from patient to patient, leaving pieces of herself behind with each loss of life and taking with her everywhere, exhaustion and the feeling of uncleanliness. When it became too much, Trinity went through the motions without thought. A cricothyrotomy on an older man with Abbot over her shoulder, and the heaviness of his blood on her hands as she went to the next. Walsh’s questioning stare as she assisted with a shoulder relocation. The beating of a heart in her ears, steady and unhurried, and the one around which her hands wrapped as she massaged it back to life.
…
22:41
Silence had taken hold of the ED after the last patient, a young girl who did not see the car careening down the busy street in time, bled out before some members of the staff. Those whose shifts had ended hours ago, but could not bring themselves to leave behind the chaos, as even away from it, death and despair would still cling to them. It was solace they sought in the company of the only people who could understand. In their eyes, there had been hope, dimming faster than life in the little girl’s eyes, that had them gathering around her at a distance.
Sunken and rimmed with red, Trinity’s own had stayed on the floor, where the blood pooled as it leaked out over the side of the gurney. She might have given the impression of indifference to anyone not privy to her thoughts, her inability to watch her final moments. But she knew it was a quiet desperation that had her looking away. Lives were not something to be held onto tightly in the ED, not when the world had a way of plucking away fingers one by one and taking them anyway. But still, Trinity could not bear to see hollowed eyes, seeing and feeling nothing.
Death came quietly for the little girl. Doctors who remained without a name to Trinity had moved around her body as clipped words left their mouths and onto the others into a knot of language that could not be undone by any onlooker. They grasped at every string until there was nothing left to pull at. All appeared crestfallen and empty as they walked away. Trinity was the only one left to watch as the white blanket was pulled over her face.
There had been no one to see her composure fracture further with each brush of a memory against the defenses she bound herself behind. A part of her wished someone had. To be seen rid of the sarcasm and bluntness she was known for might make her easier to care for. Or, she thought, it would have them running for the hills. Either way, it did not matter, for the familiar burning sensation had returned to her eyes in solitude. It spread, running along her tired muscles and to her head, where it pulsed.
Trinity sighed miserably as she rolled her shoulders back to relieve the discomfort. Night shift was called in to help the day shift hours ago, when the patients from Westbridge became too much for them alone. She went through the motions of handing off her patients to Ellis and Shen without paying mind to the former’s concerned looks or the latter’s jokes. Humor was always her preferred way of coping, but the act of moving her mouth in the shape of medical jargon was about all she could do. They were not her words, taken right from a textbook, and that might have been the only reason they could sit on her tongue without bringing bile up her throat.
She looked at the ticking line where her thinking had stopped. Hours passed with her behind the computer, typing away at a pace that would have her superiors upset on any other day, slumped over and without the will to continue. The power returned to the Pitt with less of a stir than when it had gone out. She noticed it when a welcoming coldness settled over her. She had been only relieved at the time, but now she found herself hoping it might go out once more so she could return to her bed.
Exhaustion always worsened her ability to organize her thoughts and express them coherently enough for others to understand. She already made numerous spelling errors and worried that more escaped her notice. Education had never been where her strengths lay, unlike her younger brothers, who excelled in just about anything. She barely avoided being held back a year when her parents sat her down one evening to explain their decision to leave her out of the future they had wanted for all their children.
The two crossed paths many years ago during their early years as professors, and since her birth, they had expected the same profession to be her calling. Her eventual struggles in school had been failures in their eyes. Anything but the best was. Gymnastics, they said, looking down at her from where she retreated into the couch cushions, would be better suited to a restless girl than a debate team. If she were not to use her mind to fulfill their wants, then it would be her body to bend and break for them. Her choice on the matter had been an illusion, for only absolute obedience would be enough.
Trinity had shut the door to her love of it when it first appeared on a night spent alone beneath the fluorescent lights. Never had she felt more at one with her body than when she was suspended in the air, limbs twisting and turning to a rhythm known only to her. Each step across the beam was one away from the hold her parents had on her. Their attention quickly fled once they realized her talent for it to return to her younger brothers, never once finding its way back to their eldest daughter, who sweated and bled for it despite her deliberate withdrawal. She had wanted it even as they chose the church over her.
As was the way with all things in life, it found ruination at the hands of those meant to protect her. His praise had been a drink of water after years spent wandering in the desert with only her thoughts for company. Trinity clutched it between both hands and did not realize when it soured, became poison in her lungs, suffocating. Nor had she realized until much too late that her friend was going through the same. She slipped through the cracks, and Trinity had not the time to reach out a hand to save her when both clutched at her own wounds to stop the bleeding.
Her funeral took what remained of her innocence. He was taken to prison, and Trinity to the one existing only in her mind, where she tarried throughout medical school. Spite—and the memory of her friend’s last voicemail—drove her back to education, where she spent hours huddled around textbooks to get ahead of her classmates. Her brothers were to be lawyers, and she a doctor, because nothing would have appeased both her wound-ridden self and her parents, who she still wished to be noticed by.
Her diagnosis had not been surprising in the slightest. At least not to Trinity, who spent countless nights with only the moon watching over her, trying to prove she was not ruined with research. She saw in the posts by strangers and descriptions in textbooks, pieces of the girl who had never eclipsed others in class, but whose light never went out. Medical school had not been easy in the slightest, and yet she completed it more quickly than her peers. Her parents did not go to her graduation, not that she ever expected them to, and she had walked across the stage with her diploma and enough pride in herself to make up for the lack of theirs.
“Let me take you home.”
Stillness flooded her body until even the robotic, thoughtless act of breathing was a defiance of some brand. Trinity did not expect to hear her voice so soon and despised that it still carried with it a gentleness that calmed the waters of her mind. Her eyes did not lift from the screen. She knew it was unfair of her—loathed the pettiness of it all—but could not, in fear of the final crack to her walls the sight would surely bring.
A moment passed, maybe a few. Nothing could be discerned as Trinity let the shock wash over her. The waves receded further with each unsteady inhale, yet the smell of salt and quiet destruction lingered. Feeling returned in the sensation of tiny spiders crawling along her exposed skin. She turned to take in the woman before her and pinched the skin of her thighs to stop her hands from trailing along the path they made.
The other woman’s beauty never failed to quicken the pace of her heart and take her breath away, and it didn’t today, while she tried to bring normalcy back to both. Her shoes were speckled with dried blood that was almost black in color. A sweater of the same shade was tossed over her scrub top. It did not matter. It was the sunkenness of her eyes and the look in them, devoid of the conviction Yolanda wore like armor, and maybe even the way her body seemed to sway as she stood without her perfect posture that she could not look past. Trinity had never seen her so undone, even after hours spent together in bed. A gust of wind could have knocked her over.
She set her lips into a straight line and paused. “Thought you needed a rain check.”
Her gaze went back to the computer screen as Yolanda pulled out a chair near her. A sigh reached Trinity’s ears, seemingly carrying with it the last of the woman’s energy, for she all but collapsed into the chair. From the corner of her eye, she could see her shoulders sink like the sun, and her eyes shut as she brought a hand to rub at her forehead. Trinity bit the side of one cheek to silence the questions begging to be released.
“I didn’t think I’d want to do anything but go home after a day like this,” She said gently.
She need not clarify what she meant, for Trinity knew the feeling intimately. Their profession was as rewarding as it was exhausting. She sometimes made the mistake of forgetting that Yolanda was only human, as everything about her gave the impression of being something more. Her work ethic was unlike that of anyone she had ever come across. Days away from work were spent with her nose in medical journals or out beneath the smoldering sun as she jogged through the city.
The words were low, barely enough to pierce the silence wrapped around them, but enough to draw Trinity’s eyes to her. They stared for a moment, taking in the entirety of the other. Yolanda’s gaze went from stuffy eyes to shaking hands hovering above the keyboard. The corners of her lips tugged further downwards the longer she did. “You’re tired. We both are. Please let me take you home, Trinity.”
“I,” Trinity hesitated, abhorring the weight of her next words on her tongue. She did not know how they would be received. “I’m not going to be up for anything more than sleep.”
The older woman’s eyebrows drew together as her eyes narrowed slightly. An emotion Trinity could not name was painted on her face. “I’m not going to either.”
“Okay,” She drawled. “I’m a little confused.” Trinity could not understand why the other woman would want to drive across the city from where she lived only to drop her off. That was not something they did. “So you don’t want to go home anymore?”
“I still do,” Yolanda admitted. “I also don’t want you passing out alone on the bus ride to your place. I know Whitaker already left.”
Trinity could only stare, her confusion swelling. “I still have to finish charting.”
“You do,” She said. “But that can wait till tomorrow. It’s late, and today was a bitch, no one is going to think any less of you if you do.” Yolanda looked at the screen, her bottom lip pulled between her teeth, seemingly in hesitation. “Or you can let me help you.”
She could not help but bristle at her words, even as a warmth surrounded her at the thought of being known. Yolanda had somehow seen the way she starved for affection and praise. Though if Trinity were truly to give it some thought, her preferences in bed must have painted much of the picture. She sighed, knowing she would choose anything over seeking help from another.
“Fine.”
…
23:01
The car ride carried with it that same quietness that had wrapped around them at the hospital. It was not unpleasant; in its arms, Trinity found solace. Her head rested against the window, and she watched as the familiar route unfolded with a small, sad smile. The skyline was illuminated by fireworks set off somewhere in the distance. She did not think she would ever find them as beautiful as she had when she was young again after today, seeing how they could tear apart human flesh.
Trinity felt conflicted as the other woman circled the neighborhood, finding parking a block away from her apartment after another car pulled away. Sex was always what brought one of them to the other’s place. But now, with it out of the picture entirely, she struggled to imagine how the rest of the night would play out. She wondered whether Yolanda would stay or leave as soon as the door to her car closed, and felt childish for how much she wanted her to choose the former.
Her nerves loosened her mouth. “Are you coming in?”
“Can I?” Yolanda asked, staring at her with the same odd, nameless emotion. Trinity did not want her desperation to leak into her words, so she only shrugged. “Then yes.”
She nodded at the answer and stepped out of the car into the crispness of Pittsburgh in July. She shivered, pulling the hood of her jacket that frayed at the edges. It had been given to her a week after her birthday by Dennis, who somehow scraped enough funds together to purchase it when she was not looking, after it caught her eye during one of their biweekly thrift store runs. Her reluctance to accept the gift quickly became appreciation, and she wore it more than anything else in her closet.
Trinity grabbed the rest of her belongings and heard Yolanda do the same before they began to walk along the sidewalk. Their bodies brushed against each other the entire time it took to make their way to her apartment, and even as they went up the elevator. Neither attempted to break the silence, nor did they move away from the warmth of the other.
The apartment was cloaked in darkness, with only the moonlight peeking from between the curtains. Dennis was nowhere to be found, but Trinity expected as much. He would have fallen straight into bed the second he opened the door to his room. She only hoped he found something to eat before doing so. His own exhaustion had been clear from the way his movements looked sapped of his typical vibrance by the day’s end. His offer to keep her company was denied immediately; her problems need not delay his sleep as well.
She placed her tote bag on the wooden rocking chair closest to the entryway. It was their first purchase for the apartment together from a thrift store not too far away. She heard movement in the kitchen and raised her head to see Yolanda’s silhouette rummaging through her cabinets. Trinity could not understand how she had enough left in her to make something to eat. Her appetite had faded in between patients, only to worsen during her charting. An apple or a cup of noodles would have awaited her had Yolanda not taken her home.
“You don’t have to.” She murmured, not knowing what else to say.
“I want to,” Yolanda said simply. “You should shower while I cook. Are you good with pasta?”
Trinity could do nothing but stare unblinking. It was not as if they had never had a meal together. Perhaps not at first, when both had clung to aloofness and sought out each other for intimacy alone. Though in the last few months, lines were blurred and each unknowingly crossed them to reach for the other time and time again. She had come to relish the simple pleasure of dining with her. It was everything to see her above her in bed, but something else entirely to see her across from her and smiling as she talked about her day.
“Sure. Yeah,” She agreed. “Sounds good.”
She nodded, turning to do just that. The walk from her bed to the shower was done with unseeing eyes. Trinity did not know how she ended up in the shower with water running down her body, scalding and leaving her blooming red. Or with shampoo and conditioner that smelled of sandalwood lathered into her hair. She remembered only tipping her head back and closing her eyes at some point to the quiet.
The aroma of warm butter and garlic crept into her room after she finished dressing, and she followed it back into the kitchen. She briefly contemplated bringing a pair of sweatpants for Yolanda to change into, then remembered the woman always preferred to shower before changing, as she did not enjoy the feeling of clean clothes on her sullied skin.
She took a seat at the island while Yolanda finished and plated two servings. They brought them to the living room, where they sat on the couch. A show was put on that neither knew nor cared much for, and the sounds of it faded from Trinity’s mind as she brought a forkful of the pasta into her mouth. It was not the first time Yolanda had made pasta for them both, but it felt like it after hours without food. The flavors blended into something wonderful on her tongue.
“You really didn’t have to do this,” Trinity mumbled between bites. “And I’m not just talking about the food. You didn’t have to take me home.”
“I told you,” She responded after a moment. “I wanted to.”
“Why?” It slipped from between her lips the way sap would from a tree, natural and impossible to hold back. Trinity ran through the possible answers she might receive, each able to snip the last threads that held her together. But she had to know it; to name this thing that had sprouted between them these last few weeks. And with the exhaustion of the day seeping back into her bones, she knew it had to be asked now, not when the boldness of night and dreariness left come morning.
She saw the way Yolanda’s entire body went still at the question. Her hand hovered just before her mouth, and remained there for a few seconds until she placed the fork back into the bowl. She placed it on the coffee table to free her hands, which then began to fiddle with the drawstrings of her scrub pants. Trinity thought the sight of Yolanda gathering herself was not hers to see, and so she turned back to the television.
There was not much space between them. The couch was small enough as is, and they always sought out each other’s warmth. She honed in on the feeling and waited.
The silence was unbearable, but Trinity did nothing to break it. She had tried to, back when similar conversations almost happened in the late hours of the night. The cover of the moon, and the euphoria of bodies sliding against each other beneath sheets, always had them taking turns revealing their cards. Only to bring them back to their chest when the fear of perception overrode their longing to be seen by the other. Trinity would cover herself in humor, while Yolanda shed herself of everything and disappeared.
“Do I need a reason to?”
“Kind of, yeah,” Trinity replied.
“I,” She hesitated, eyes remaining on the screen. Yolanda was never one to avoid eye contact, and Trinity wondered what was going on in her head to have her doing so. “I don’t want whatever this is between us anymore.”
Time slowed so that seconds felt like years. Her words were not what Trinity had wanted to hear. She had hoped, with what little remained of it, that Yolanda might have wanted more. That the desire she knew existed for her would have been not only for her body, but her mind and every little piece that made her up. She played the fool and it was all being thrown back at her.
Trinity leaned back, having gotten closer while eating. Her chest felt tight, as if someone were bearing down on her, and each inhale felt in defiance of something greater. She felt the burning behind her eyes and hoped she truly had no tears left to give. She did not want her anguish to be seen.
She felt the other woman turn to her immediately. “Wait, I,” Yolanda hurried, her face pinched in panic. “That’s not what I meant. I didn’t mean it like that. Fuck, I’m so bad at this,” Her hand rose to cradle her head, and with her attention elsewhere, Trinity finally looked at her again.
Her entire body seemed to tremble with the emotions she barely held back. Hands at her head and clutching the fabric of her pants were absent of the steadiness that garnered the deference of all who saw her in her element. She was nothing like the woman who had first drawn Trinity in like a moth to a flame, and still, she could not look away. Hope returned in waves, lapped against her feet, and although the waters were cold, Trinity threw herself into them.
She did not attempt to speak or offer physical comfort, knowing from the one time she tried it would not be received well. Instead, she waited patiently.
The other woman took several deep breaths. A minute, maybe more, passed before Yolanda straightened and met Trinity’s gaze with a resolve that was both frightening and comforting. She cautiously extended a hand and placed it onto one of Trinity’s own at her nod.
Yolanda’s gaze was soft as she brought Trinity’s wrist to her lips and pressed a delicate kiss against her pulse. “I mean, I want more. I don’t want to have you only at night; I want you in every imaginable way.” Trinity’s breath stuttered, but she remained silent. “It isn’t enough for me anymore, what we have. I wanted it to be—fucking needed it to be—but it isn’t, and that terrifies me.” She paused. “But it terrifies me more to think of a life without you.”
Trinity’s eyes widened a little as she took in the other’s words. Women had expressed their want for more with her before, but she had never been able to let herself want that the same. The thought of willingly handing another the key to her soul, that could both reveal and unravel it entirely, frightened her more than anything else in life. But then she thought of Dennis and Yolanda, and how she wanted to for them. She wanted to be seen without falsities and performance, even if they might eventually leave like everyone else.
“It does?” She asked lightly.
“Yes.”
The way she said it took Trinity’s breath away. With her head against her pillow, she would often wonder how the other woman would express her love for her were she to feel it as Trinity did with her entire being. In each attempt to capture her, Trinity realized she always failed to affix a wobbly tone to her voice. She assumed Yolanda would go about confessing her love the same way she did surgery: steady and sure. But Yolanda looked so uncertain, so worried about how her words would be taken now that Trinity was speechless.
She almost wished to laugh at their situation. For months, they both must have loved each other in secret, fearing they were alone in their feelings, and pushed the other away to give themselves more space to wallow in them. Trinity thought of the days and nights spent running the palm of her hand over rumpled sheets, wishing more than anything the person whose warmth still lingered there would come back to her. She thought of all the deleted texts and times she closed her mouth, choosing silence over the truth she feared. And she thought of her lover, who would have been miles away, doing the same in her own little way.
“I want that too,” Trinity confessed. She could have exhaled in relief at the weight lifted from her shoulders, were she not in a rush to say all she had not let herself before. “I have for a while. I didn’t realize it at first, but then I began to think of you all the time. I drove Huckleberry crazy with how much I talked about you to him.” She scratched the side of her neck at the admission, having not wanted to paint that clear a picture of her exact feelings so soon. “But it was so difficult to know if you felt the same. One moment you would be all over me, and then the next you couldn’t even look me in the eye at work.” Quiter. “You barely even looked at me today.”
Yolanda closed her eyes and sighed. “I know.” She uttered, her words laced with an infectious somberness. “And I’m so sorry, Trinity. It wasn’t anything you did. I just…I didn’t know how to keep everything separate. Which is embarrassing because I’m a grown ass adult. But I’ve never let myself get this far with anyone else. Everything between us has been so new, and I am not good at dealing with change. But you deserve better, and I will do anything to be that for you.”
Apologies were not often given to Trinity by anyone in her life. She learned long ago that silence was the most she could expect. She was at a loss for how to respond to Yolanda. “You don’t have to apologize; it’s not like I was any better.” She said, thinking of all the times she had avoided traumas after confusing mornings, and dressed herself quickly to escape uncomfortable conversations. “I didn’t say that to blame you or anything. I guess I’m…scared. It’s different with you. But I’m even worse at relationships and feelings. I always have been. And I’m usually more trouble than I’m worth.”
“I should never have said that,” Yolanda whispered. She had apologized a few weeks after the incident over cocktails, and sporadically throughout the past few months whenever she thought her last had not been enough. Trinity forgave her before the first. “You’re cocky, a little bit of an asshole sometimes, and you never know when not to tell a joke. But Trinity, I have liked that about you since the day I met you. And you are so much more than that. I see how much you care for your patients, Whitaker, and literally everyone.” She offered a weak, teasing smile. “And I am definitely more of an asshole than you, so I am in no place to judge.”
A quiet giggle sounded from her before she could do anything to stop it. Yolanda’s demeanor had also been what first captured her attention. The way she bickered with Langdon, Robby, and just about everyone else in the hospital for the fun of it. The nicknames she gave to every doctor, and the entertaining commentary whispered between cases, and sometimes during, to Trinity whenever her spirits were low. She knew the other woman had taken to her occasional bratiness well, but always thought it was the appeal of getting her willing and compliant that kept her around.
“Yeah, you are,” Trinity joked with a smile that quickly fell. She pulled her hand from the other woman’s and wrapped both arms around her legs. “What is it, exactly, that you want?” She needed to know whether Yolanda swam at the same depth she did in this feeling, for she could not bring herself to give in completely until she knew she was not alone.
“Everything we haven’t been letting ourselves have,” Yolanda replied. “I don’t want to pretend that this is casual anymore. It never was. You mean so much to me, Trinity, and I want you to know that.”
“So…a relationship?”
“I think we have already been acting like we are in one for months,” She said, amusement seeping into her tone. “But yes, I want that. If that’s something you do too.”
“I do,” Trinity answered without hesitation. “I really do. It’s a little embarrassing how badly I want that with you. And somehow everyone seemed to know it before I did.”
Yolanda snorted. “I don’t think we were exactly subtle.” She tentatively reached out a hand, and Trinity placed her own on top, needing the contact as much as the other woman seemed to. “I know I wasn’t with how much I brought you up during consults.”
“Yeah, you definitely gave us away.”
“Oh, like you were any better,” Yolanda laughed, the sound so full of life that Trinity had to join. “With all the heart-eyes you’d give me while presenting. Or the flirting over patients.”
“Let’s just agree to disagree, wouldn’t want you to lose our first couple’s quarrel so soon,” She smiled.
The other woman simply shook her head and smiled. Her thumb gently caressed the soft skin of her wrist, and Trinity lost herself to the sensation. “Okay,” Trinity placed her hand on her cheek. Exhaustion of the day finally caught up to her and pulled her beneath the waters. She let them, knowing a hand would always be there for her to grab when it became too much. “Okay. If we’re going to do this, we’ll need to talk more.” She yawned. “But I am about to pass out. Could we maybe wait till morning?”
Yolanda placed her own hand against Trinity’s on the side of her face. “That’s probably for the best. You’ve looked moments from collapsing the entire day.” A pause then, as she stared into Trinity’s eyes. It would seem Yolanda had seen past the mask of indifference Trinity had clung to throughout the day. She imagined it would be one of the first things they talked about in the morning. The thought was not as frightening as it should have been. “We can wait till the morning.”
…
July 5
1:05
Bodies came together beneath the covers with the moonlight bathing them in a soft glow. Arms were wrapped around her waist, and the exposed skin where her shirt had ridden up burned at the touch. As it did all along her limbs to a path known in her heart as the embodiment of their love. She knew not where the lines of oneness blurred, or of the face of their joining, that anchored itself to life and split from consciousness. The heat of her soul, theirs, and very well might the same become of her thoughts, yet fear of opening herself to it waned, no more than a passing gale.
Into an abyss went the day’s memories, and those dried beneath the sun married to nightfall, as she sank into something else, suspended from time and existing between what is and what could be. But over the verge she dwelled, withheld from absolute immersion by that same spectre which found sustenance in the darkness that leaked from cracks deep and hidden. She wanted to fall, to know what lay on the other side, evading her for a lifetime, with a vigor unbeknownst to her.
“There’a lot you still don’t know about me,” Trinity whispered, so terribly lonely away from what remained of her walls. She almost wished to follow the familiar prints back, but the pull in her bones was not enough to shroud the addicting feeling of being seen bare and without illusion, and still, wanted. She would fill in the gaps in the other woman’s mind, beginning with the unmasking of her greatest fears. “I’m not ready to talk about a lot of it, yet, but I’m…worried that when I do, you won’t see me the same.”
Seconds passed, each without notice, and the familiar heat of shame trailed up the back of her neck. The hour was late, and the day had taken so much from them both; sleep would already have found the other woman, whose eyes always shut the moment her head fell against the pillows. She should not have expected her to be kept up by the same incessant worries.
“There’s nothing you could tell me that would change how I feel about you,” A voice, raspy as if sleep’s tempting call was not enough to take her away, despite its best efforts. “Not unless you’re some serial killer. Maybe not even then, because I know you’d have a good reason.”
A joke sat on the tip of her tongue, having found its way through the stream of thought with ease, as all others twisted into shapeless feeling. She opened her mouth, but did not want humor to be what she always ran to when uncertainty found her. And she no longer wanted to offer the other woman humor, lies, and half-truths when all were what kept them from what they truly desired. Yolanda deserved more, and Trinity was starting to realize she did as well.
“You say that now,” She settled on saying.
“I am,” Yolanda said. “And I will keep saying it whenever you need to hear it.” The arms around her middle tightened. “I’ll admit, I’m also a little worried you might see me differently the more you get to know me.”
“Then,” She paused, thinking of all the therapy sessions she attended throughout her life. “What if we made it a little less intimidating? We don’t have to tell each other our entire lives at once; we could take it step by step. You can ask me questions, too. I know you’ve tried in the past, and I didn’t react well, but I want you to now. I want you to know me.”
“I think I can do that,” The other woman said. “Can I use one of my questions now?” Trinity nodded. “Who told you that you were more trouble than you’re worth. We don’t have to get into it right this moment, but I’d like to know.” She added a moment later. “If that’s okay with you.”
She swallowed down the rising nerves with relative ease, having expected that Yolanda would have caught onto that. And she knew all that haunted her began with the woman who failed to protect her when she needed it most. “My mother,” She breathed. “We’ve never gotten along. I wasn’t the best kid.”
“You were still only a kid,” She paused. “I’m so sorry you ever had to hear that.” Her thumb gently stroked the skin where it rested. “And it’s not true, Trinity, you are worth everything.”
Trinity snorted. “I’d love to see her face hearing that.” Her hand fell to the other woman’s wrist, and stayed while she took a moment for her words to settle. They did not stitch together her wounds, but the bleeding slowed with each brush of them against where she hurt most. “I know that, or at least part of me does, but knowing doesn’t make it feel any less real sometimes. I haven’t even seen her in years, and yet she still has so much power over me.” She closed her eyes. “I hate it.”
“She’s your mother,” Her voice was barely above a whisper. “Things like that don’t just go away.” She paused. “I’m sorry, I…I feel like I’m messing this up somehow.”
She moved to put space between them, but Trinity held onto her wrist and interlaced their fingers. “You aren’t. I’m not telling you because I think you have all the answers I need. I’m doing it because I want you to know why I am the way I am. All I want you to do is listen and stay.”
“I can do that,” Yolanda said after a moment. “I won’t make the mistake of leaving again.”
“And I won’t either,” She promised. “Can I ask you something?”
“You’re not tired anymore?”
“No, believe me, I am,” Trinity grumbled. “But I won’t be able to fall asleep if I don’t. It’s only fair since you got to ask me one.” She was only teasing, knowing that if Yolanda truly did not wish to disclose anything that night, she would never hold it against her.
“Okay, ask away.”
Trinity paused, trying to give shape to the feelings that resounded in her mind ever since that night, all those weeks ago, when the two had gotten scared when confronted with what slowly prospered between them. “What happened when I tried to ask what we were?”
The hesitation she felt from Yolanda was expected. She gave her time, and was pleasantly surprised when the silence ended as quickly as it began. “I panicked. I’ve never felt the way I do for you with anyone else. I also couldn’t tell if I was alone with what I was feeling. And you were right, I’ve never been great at commitment.”
“Because of your parents?”
“Think that’s two questions, baby,” Yolanda replied. The term of endearment was not anything novel, as the two always took to using similar ones in the throes of passion. It felt different, though, to have it meant for her in an entirely different context. She found herself liking it more than she would have thought.
“Humor me.”
“Yes, because of them.” She answered. “I don’t think they ever really cared for each other. Convenience brought them together and kept them in an unhappy marriage for years before they passed away in an accident when I was young. I told myself I wouldn’t ever be like that.” Her voice broke near the end, and Trinity moved to turn in her arms.
Yolanda’s arm tightened once more, seemingly unwilling to let her get far, before loosening a moment later. She could see only the crease between her brows, the sharp line of her jaw, and the unmistakable look of sadness in her eyes when she turned, all bathed in the moonlight. Trinity was heartbroken at the sight and cupped her face between both hands to place a kiss on her forehead. The other woman leaned into the contact, closing her eyes, and silence filled the room while they breathed in each other.
“I guess I didn’t realize when that turned into me never letting myself get close to anyone.” She said with her eyes still shut to the world. “I’d told myself it was fine; that I would be selfish if I didn’t make the most of what they had come to this country for.” She paused. “Every single part of my life was planned in perfect detail, from med school to where I’d apply for fellowships. And then you came along and made me want more from life.”
“I did that?” Trinity asked quietly.
The other woman opened her eyes. “Yes, without you, I’d be across the country. I stayed in Pittsburgh because I couldn’t leave, and then, like an idiot, got scared that I departed from my plans like they were nothing and took it out on you. I’m so sorry, Trinity, you didn’t deserve for me to have kicked you out like that.”
“And you didn’t deserve to have all of that on your shoulders,” She cut in, sensing that the other woman would continue wallowing in guilt if she did not pull her out. “You were also only a kid.” Trinity averted her gaze to take in the shadows moving across the ceiling. “I didn’t know you had meant to leave Pittsburgh.”
“I didn’t know how to tell you,” Yolanda said. “It had never been where I imagined myself living for long, but I don’t want you to think I regret staying. I’m glad I did.”
“I’m glad you did too.” Trinity smiled. She knew there was much left for them to discuss, and they would, but sleep’s call was louder than all voices in her mind, and it sat heavy on her eyelids. She almost gave in to the feeling before remembering a conversation earlier in the day. “Fuck, now I own Huckleberry twenty.” She groaned. “He thinks he’s the shit now that he has a few dollars in the bank.”
In truth, Trinity was delighted to see him grow into himself. He was not that same, mousy-eyed medical student sleeping in an abandoned wing of the hospital. He now met her humor with his own special kind and carried a confidence in his every move that she was beyond proud of. His offer to help with rent had been denied immediately, but not because she thought anything of him. It was only because she cared more than she would like to admit.
Yolanda opened an eye, her brows raising in apparent interest and confusion. Trinity smoothed the crease between them with her thumb. “He bet that I was just in my head and that everything would be okay. Our own happily ever after.”
“What were you in your head about?” She asked. A moment passed as they stared at each other. “About the rain check thing?” A nod. “Really? I said I might need one, and that literally implies that if I didn’t then, I’d want to another time.”
“Yeah, I get that now,” Trinity pursed her lips, a little embarrassed to have leapt to conclusions before truly knowing where Yolanda stood. She saw Yolanda’s lips twitch and felt hers do the same, so she pushed gently at her shoulder. “Shut up.”
Yolanda went with the push and fell onto her back, laughing all the way. Trinity moved to straddle her hips. “Whatever, so what if I can be a little dramatic sometimes? Nothing new. And I should be allowed to after today.” She saw the way the reminder of the day had Yolanda’s laughter dying down and a small frown replacing her smile. The other woman’s fingers went under her shirt and rubbed at the warm skin she found there. “It’s fine, Yoyo, the day’s over.”
The nickname got the eyeroll she wanted, and Trinity smiled, staring down at her with loving eyes. She was so beautiful, painted in the soft glow of night. Trinity leaned down slowly, taking in the way her eyes widened before flickering shut. She hovered for a moment before pressing their lips together. Their kiss was slow, sensual in a way that was numbing, even without the typical passion that underlines most. It was everything to Trinity, and she smiled into it, feeling Yolanda do the same. She pulled away only to then burrow her face into her neck, breathing in the scent of the woman she loved.
It was absolutely beautiful, what lay on the other side.